The Nanny (19 page)

“Or is this a social call?” she asked him, her sarcasm so acidic it could have burnt the phone line.

“Um, yes,” said Anthony, all slyness gone from his voice. “We're ready for you.”

They arranged the soonest available time for everyone to meet and rang off.

After the call, Anthony stared into the middle distance biting his lower lip for a full five minutes.

This was exactly what he'd been dreading. Vanessa's brittle tone told him she was not happy. But was that because he'd kissed her, because he'd been late with the scripts, or because he hadn't called her after he'd kissed her?

The day after sharing with Vanessa Fitzgerald the kiss that had shot up to joint Number 1 on his all-time earth-shattering kiss list (together with the one he'd shared with Lucy Spires from first year round the bike sheds when he thought his body was literally going to explode) he had felt great. His ideas came thick and fast, and he and Tom had worked furiously on the campaign.

He was on such a high that the last thing he could do was call Vanessa. It was too big a risk. (Lucy Spires—raw, fearless Lucy Spires—had gone into school the day after the magnificent bike shed experience and magically rechristened him All-talk Anthony. How the hell was he supposed to know she'd take it personally that he hadn't let his body explode? Why didn't anyone just tell you the rules?) He couldn't face that experience again.

The longer he left it, the more the kiss with Vanessa became a pure fact, uncomplicated by afterthoughts, regrets, or apologies. He hadn't wanted it ruined. And now it would all be ruined. He would have to see Vanessa again, hear her icy tone, feel her indifference. At least he had one thing on his side, he thought gratefully. Thank God he'd be in a six-foot-tall bunny suit.

 

Vanessa buzzed Tricia, who had to then humiliate herself by canceling an important meeting with another big client. The two women stood together in the lift. Vanessa smiled at her junior. She knew it wasn't fair that Tricia had had to look an idiot in front of the most notoriously awful clients, just because the Creatives chose this moment to be ready.

“Were they awful?” Vanessa asked her.

“They called me a lying whore.”

Vanessa gasped. “You're joking?”

Tricia shook her head.

“Don't worry, I'll have a word with Max,” said Vanessa. When Tricia's chin started quivering, she added. “Come on, chin up. Think bonuses. I'll see what I can do for you.”

Tricia managed a smile.

“But of course I will have to know one thing, purely to back up our case,” said Vanessa, in a matter-of-fact tone.”
Are
you a lying whore?”

By the time the door was opening, Tricia was managing a smile.

Vanessa had already had to have soothing words with Max, who was getting jittery and was now popping into her office on average four times a day. Of course, he'd never bother Creatives—they were far too precious to bother—so he'd shouted at her instead. He was on his way up to the meeting—he'd been called out of a working lunch.

Oh boy
, she thought,
this presentation had better be good
. She had butterflies.
Oh boy
, she thought,
this had better be because of the presentation
.

She and Tricia walked into the office and found a six-foot-tall white
rabbit drinking a cup of tea, pinkie daintily held out. He stood up when he saw them come in and made a deep, majestic bow.

“Welcome…to
Wonder
land,” came Anthony's warm, sexy voice from inside the rabbit costume.

The backs of Vanessa's knees went spongy.

 

“I love it!” bellowed Max. “
Love
it!”

Anthony watched Vanessa and Tricia smile at Max from behind his outfit.

“
Rabbit
on the phone!
Rabbit
on the phone!
A Wonderland
of communication! I love it!” repeated Max. “Fucking genius!”

Anthony was sweating like a pig in his rabbit outfit, but it had been worth it. It was unheard of for Creatives to get dressed up for anything other than the actual pitch before, but he and Tom had been so nervous they'd decided to go ahead anyway. And it had worked. Not only that, but the bunny outfit made him feel strangely braver.

After the meeting, he swiveled his head inside the costume and watched Vanessa slowly and carefully tidy her pens and notebooks while the others left the room. Suddenly, he leaned across the table and rested his big white paw on her hand. She jumped slightly. So did he. He watched her look up into his eyes.

“Please take that outfit off, Anthony,” she said.

“How are you?” he asked, hearing his muffled voice echo back to him.

“Fine!” she exclaimed. “Why wouldn't I be? I'm in Wonderland.”

He followed her out of the office. Max, Tricia, and Tom were already out of sight. As they came to the door of one of the stock cupboards, Anthony spotted that Vanessa's head turned fractionally toward it. Without pausing for thought, he grabbed her round the waist, pushed open the door and tumbled her into the cupboard, slamming the door behind them.

They stood, breathing heavily, in the pitch-black silence, surrounded by four thousand Silly Nibble chocolate biscuits.

“What the hell am I in here for?” whispered Vanessa, her voice trembling.

“Well, rabbits are known to excel at one thing in particular,” he said, edging her away from the door.

“Let me out,” she whispered, backing away from the door.

“Okay,” he said, kissing her.

Five minutes later, Vanessa pushed her way out of the Silly Nibble cupboard door, straightened her hair, did up her top button, and rushed to follow the others.

By the time Jo was rounding up the children for the fourth time that day to collect Cassandra from school and Josh from work, she was exhausted.

Tallulah fell asleep the second Jo strapped her into her car seat, snoring so loudly that neither Jo nor Zak could hear Zak's favorite tape. By the time Jo had eventually found a parking space in the limited Hampstead spaces, put her sticker on the window, and dragged Tallulah out of her seat, the little girl had been deeply and happily unconscious. Naturally, as anyone would be after being dragged out of an idyllic slumber, Tallulah was grumpy. So grumpy, in fact, that if she hadn't been four years old, Jo would have assumed she had PMS.

“Don't sing that song, Zak,” whined Tallulah, as Zak hummed the tune on his tape that he'd been trying to listen to on the way there.

“Stop walking ahead, Zak,” she whined. Zak and Jo exchanged quick knowing looks and kept as quiet as possible.

When Tallulah dropped precariously off to sleep in Jo's arms, Jo gave Zak a quick wink, and whispered, “Good practice.” He didn't know what it meant, but he grinned anyway.

Tallulah refused to walk, so Jo had to carry her all the way to the school gates. A deadweight four-year-old is heavy at the best of times; a deadweight four-year-old with PMS is somehow far heavier.

Jo walked up the steps to the playground where the children milled around waiting to be picked up. Cassandra, as usual, was standing to one side with her little friend Asha, who somehow always made Jo want to say very kindly, “I am not going to abduct you.”

“Do you want to sit in the front until we pick up Josh?” Jo asked her when they got to the car.

“Alright,” said Cassandra.

None of the children talked to each other on the walk back to the car, and Jo let them be. She knew that sometimes you just want to be alone with your thoughts, especially after a hard day.

By the time the prepremenstrual post-toddler was strapped safely in her seat, Zak and Cassandra were already arguing. Their rows could flare up faster than a rocket up a cat's tail. One second they could be giggling together, the next trying to kill each other, then back to giggling. Jo was firm but fair. It was Cassandra's turn to listen to the music, Zak had listened to his on the way there. Zak soared into an apoplectic fury because he hadn't been able to hear his tape thanks to Tallulah's snoring, until Tallulah sorted out the situation by snoring so loudly no one could hear Cassandra's music either.

By the time they got to Highgate Station, the evening had turned fine, and Josh was waiting in the sun, his tie loosened and a smooth olive-skinned collarbone just peeking out of his navy blue shirt. Jo took a deep breath, beeped her horn, and turned away when he looked up. He grinned at his family and tousled Cassandra's hair as she got out of the front for him and moved into the back. Cassandra grinned ruefully, the dark netherworld of school already diminishing to the background of her real life, where she was Number 1 child with a pretty nanny, a fun half brother, and a mummy and daddy who'd be home soon.

Josh got into the front seat.

“How's the family?” he asked, in a particularly friendly voice. Jo's spirits rose.

“Fine!” they all shouted.

“I meant these ones,” he said, pointing to Jo's cuddly toys on the dashboard. “Daffy, Duffy, Dozy, and Dud.”

Jo tutted. “Huh. I won't leave you to name the children.”

Damn. That had sounded different outside than in. She wanted to counter it with some pithy, pointed backstitch comment but was preoccupied by her skin shifting and resettling. And, anyway, Josh had either not heard it or ignored it and was turning round already, teasing the children.

“
Josh!”
bellowed Zak, as if Josh was still in his office and deaf. “Will you play cricket with me when we get in?”

“Jo! After my homework, can I do your hair?” asked Cassandra.

Tallulah snored like a rhinoceros in the back, and they all laughed.

Jo concentrated on driving without grinding the gears as much as her teeth. She couldn't tell what she wanted to do most—apologize again to Josh or hit him very hard on his bruises.

Josh settled into his seat. “Another day another dollar.”

“For some,” said Jo pleasantly. “My day's only halfway through.”

“Good thing it's an easy job then.” Jo almost stalled.

Later, as the children galloped ahead into the house and Jo and Josh
bent down to pick up the new yellow pages outside the front door, Jo told him quietly but firmly, “I think Cassandra had a horrid day.”

He caught her eye. When their knees touched briefly, they both acted as if they'd got an electric shock.

“What makes you say that?” he asked.

Jo shrugged. “I don't know.” She looked ahead at Cassandra, already inside the hall. “Just…be gentle with her.”

“Thank you,” he said. “Until you came along, I always treated Cassandra with a rod of iron.” And he walked into the house ahead of her.

She locked her jaw as she stood up and followed him.

 

It was a long evening. Jo and Josh divided responsibilities without conferring, Josh playing with Zak in the garden and Jo playing with Cassie and Tallulah in the conservatory. Jo found it hard to believe that only last week she would have found it more fun for Josh to be indoors. She hoped Zak was tiring him out in the garden.

Meanwhile, in the garden, Zak was tiring Josh out, winning at cricket with all the grace and goodwill of a six-year-old boy.

“I'm winning!”
he yelled inside to Jo.
“I'm killing him!!”

“Good boy,” said Jo. “I'm proud of you.”

Zak, giggling, raced back outside to thrash his half brother. He hoped Josh would never leave.

“I don't think I want to bowl anymore,” said Josh, pulling his shirt out of his trousers and flapping it to give himself some air.

“But I'm in bat,” said Zak nonplussed.

“Oh.”

“You can be wicketkeeper,” offered Zak magnanimously.

“Wow!” exclaimed Josh. “You mean I get to keep your wickets? Forever?'

Josh enjoyed the delicious sound, like water trickling off rocks, of a boy unable to control his giggles.

“No!” said Zak, when he was able to speak. “They're
my
wickets!”

“That's awfully good of you,” continued Josh. “I'd have thought you'd want to keep them.”

Zak tried to get a grip.

“No,” he gasped, “that's not what wicketkeeper
means
!”

“How long can I keep them for?”

More water trickling off rocks, then some serious cricket and half an hour later, after Josh had been thrashed good and proper, he pretended to
collapse, which took longer than he'd hoped, given the bruises. He lay on the grass, blinking up at the sky. “I'm dead,” he said gravely. “The shock of losing to a four-year-old.”

Zak became hysterical with laughter again, jumping from foot to foot.

“I'm
six
!! Not
four
!!”

“Sorry.
Five
-year-old.”

“
Six!”
managed Zak.

“I'm going to heaven now,” said Josh, getting up slowly. “In the kitchen. Look after my plants.”

Zak followed Josh inside, yelling, “
I won! I beat him!
” He overtook him, barely noticing Josh stop still in the doorway.

Jo was motionless, sitting cross-legged on the floor by the conservatory window, her back elegant and straight. Her thick dark hair was being meticulously plaited by the two silent girls, who were draped around her. Tallulah was sitting on Jo's lap, Cassie kneeling behind her. Six limbs were intertwined and every now and then, soft whispers of encouragement from Jo caused flickers of half smiles. Occasionally, Jo stroked Tallulah's head, and Cassie hugged Jo. The sun was coming in through the conservatory doors, and a deep glow of blue seemed to lighten the strands of Jo's hair that Tallulah kept dropping.

Josh stepped inside the room slowly, like a swimmer hauling himself out of water.

“
I beat him!
” repeated Zak.

Jo spoke without moving. “Well done, Zak, just in time for tea.”

Zak found little to engage him with the girls and joined Josh back at the garden door.

“Mate,” said Josh with a knowing wink. “The ladies don't like it when you hold your ding-dong.”

Zak became temporarily speechless with laughter.

“The ladies! My ding-dong!” He giggled eventually, then stopped suddenly. “What's for tea?” he asked.

Jo pointed to the oven and hob, where some vegetables were steaming and some fish fingers were grilling.

“Fish fingers, chips, broccoli, and peas,” she said, handing Cassie a hairband. “Are you going to be a good boy and lay the table?”

“Alright then,” said Josh. “But only because you called me a good boy.”

The children had hysterics. Jo handed Tallulah the other hairband.
The girls had finished her hair. She stood up and twirled for them to appraise their handiwork.

“Tallulah's is lower than mine,” said Cassandra. “She looks awful.”

“No she doesn't,” said Tallulah. “Does she, Josh?”

Josh crossed his arms and made great play of studying Jo. She was wearing three-quarter-length trousers and a T-shirt with a picture of a little pink heart on her chest. She'd been studiously copied by Cassandra and Tallulah down to the color and style of their hairbands, the only visible differences being that they both had nail polish on and no breasts. The three of them stared defiantly back at him.

“Hmm,” thought Josh out loud. “Does Jo look awful? Let. Me. Think.”

After a while, Jo moved to the oven to start preparing tea.

“She looks like a ten-year-old,” Josh said eventually, joining her at the hob.

“Well,” muttered Jo, her head half in the oven. “Better than acting like one.” She took her head out of the oven and found Josh staring at her with an inscrutable expression on his face. Had she gone too far? Flushed, she remembered what Shaun had said about Josh being a spy for his mother. Could he get her into trouble?

“Where are the forks?” asked Zak, suddenly behind them.

When Jo's mobile rang, and it was her mum, she made a point of asking Cassandra to finish the tea, instead of asking Josh.

“I'll do it,” said Josh quietly.

“No, it's fine,” said Jo.

“I can do it,” said Cassandra.

“I don't mind,” said Josh pointedly. “I'm not a child, I can look after my own family.”

Jo stared at him. Then said into the phone, “Mum, can I phone you back—”

“Don't be ridiculous,” interrupted Josh, his voice rising. “Speak to your mother, I'll finish doing the tea.” As she went into her bedroom, she heard him muttering, “No one's indispensable.”

She shut the bedroom door behind her.

“How's Dad?” she asked.

“He's got a checkup next week,” answered Hilda. “I'm terrified. He hasn't been looking good lately.”

“He hasn't been looking good for the past fifty years,” said Jo. “But we still love him.”

There was a pause. “How are you there, love?” asked Hilda.

“I'm fine, Mum. How are—”

“They feed you properly?”

“Well, they feed me, but most of their food's really weird.”

“They're not Asians are they?”

“Mum! No, they just eat differently.”

“You're getting your meat and two veg?”

“Yes, Mum. I—Would you like me to come home?”

“Course not!” exclaimed Hilda. “What d'you want to come home for?”

“To see you, silly.”

“What d'you want to come home to see me for?”

“Because I miss you!”

“Don't be ridiculous. You're far too busy. Can't go rushing off all the time—what would they think? Mind you, I think your dad misses you a bit.”

“I'll come next weekend.”

“Ooh, lovely!”

“Oh no! I can't. The weekend after.”

“Smashing.”

“I'd better go.”

“Right.”

“I've got to give the kids tea. Their half brother's with us, and I think he may be checking up on me.”

“Oh dear.”

When Jo returned, she found the children seated politely at the table, eating quietly. She started tidying the kitchen up around them.

“I know what I want for my birthday,” announced Zak, milk moustaching his upper lip.

“Do you?” asked Josh. “What?”

“I need a digital watch.”

“Didn't Mummy and Daddy buy you a watch last year?” asked Cassandra. “You keep breaking them.”

“You're right,” said Zak seriously. “Perhaps I should get two.”

“How many children do you want when you're older?” Cassandra asked Tallulah gravely, forking her peas.

“Four,” answered Tallulah. “How many do you want?”

“Two,” said Cassandra.

“Do you want a boy and a girl, or a girl and a girl or a boy and a boy?” asked Tallulah, in between small, pensive mouthfuls of broccoli.

“Boy and a girl,” came the rapid reply.

Jo smiled. “I don't think it works like that. You don't get a choice.”

The girls thought about this.

“You might get a boy and a
boy
,” whispered Tallulah.

There was a long, long pause.

“Tallulah's so lucky,” whined Zak suddenly. “She's got more chips than me. That's not right.”

“Lula, honey,” coaxed Jo, using her soft Tallulah voice. “Do you think you'll be able to eat all those chips?”

Tallulah looked at her plate and considered the question. “Probably not.”

“Would you give Zak some?”

Tallulah handed Zak some of her chips.